IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v185y2025ics0305750x24002626.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Land reform, emerging grassroots democracy and political trust in China

Author

Listed:
  • Chen, Xing
  • Xu, Jintao
  • Yi, Yuanyuan
  • Zhuge, Andong

Abstract

This study explores how the application of democratic rule in land reform decision-making determines villagers’ political trust towards different levels of the government in China. Analyzing a two-period household survey dataset, we find that in China’s recent Collective Forest Tenure Reform, which has devolved the tenure rights of the village collective-owned forestland to households, democratic decision-making increases trust for town and county cadres. The impact on trust towards village cadres is significant only when democracy involves all villagers in a village. We show two mechanisms that improve villagers’ trust: the “privatization” effect, where democratic decision-making leads to more land devolved to villagers, and the “conflict-resolving” effect, where improved information and cohesion by mass participation helps resolve inter-village land disputes. Heterogeneity analyses show that democratic decision-making has a more pronounced effect in improving trust for villagers with lower income, and those without affiliation with the Chinese Communist Party or village committees.

Suggested Citation

  • Chen, Xing & Xu, Jintao & Yi, Yuanyuan & Zhuge, Andong, 2025. "Land reform, emerging grassroots democracy and political trust in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 185(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:185:y:2025:i:c:s0305750x24002626
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106792
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X24002626
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106792?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Political trust; Grassroots democracy; Land reform; Collective Forest Tenure Reform; China;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions
    • O17 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Formal and Informal Sectors; Shadow Economy; Institutional Arrangements
    • P21 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist and Transition Economies - - - Planning, Coordination, and Reform
    • P25 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist and Transition Economies - - - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics
    • P26 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist and Transition Economies - - - Property Rights
    • P32 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions - - - Collectives; Communes; Agricultural Institutions

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:185:y:2025:i:c:s0305750x24002626. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.